California Congressman Robert Matsui died last Saturday. He was 63 years old and died of a rare type of bone marrow cancer. Matsui had served in Congress for 26 years. Most recently he was the Democrat’s point man on Social Security, and in the weeks before his death, he seemed eager to lead the fight against Republican proposals for privatization of the program.
Matsui was also an outspoken leader for Japanese-Americans. As an infant during the Second World War, he was sent to an internment camp with his family. He worked throughout his life to gain recognition for the tens of thousands of other Japanese-Americans who had shared that fate.
On November 4, 2001 Matsui spoke about that lifelong effort at the John F. Kennedy Library in Boston. Hear an excerpt of that speech.
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